Howard Ray > Howard's Quotes

“I write, therefore I procrastinate.”
― Howard Ray

“It is a great thing to start life with a small number of really good books which are your very own.”
― Arthur Conan Doyle

“Melancholy is sadness that has taken on lightness.”
― Italo Calvino

“Once, poets were magicians. Poets were strong, stronger than warriors or kings — stronger than old hapless gods. And they will be strong once again.”
― Greg Bear

“Some people care too much. I think it's called love.”
― A.A. Milne, Winnie-the-Pooh

“I'm not saying that everything is survivable. Just that everything except the last thing is.”
― John Green, Paper Towns

“Love isn't an act, it's a whole life.”
― Brian Moore

“Book collecting is an obsession, an occupation, a disease, an addiction, a fascination, an absurdity, a fate. It is not a hobby. Those who do it must do it.”
― Jeanette Winterson

“Laughter is man's most distinctive emotional expression.”
― Margaret Mead

“Quietness is an essential part of all awareness. In quiet times and sleepy times, a child can dwell in thoughts of his own, and in songs and stories of his own.”
― Margaret Wise Brown

“If you tell the truth, you don't have to remember anything.”
― Mark Twain

“The unendurable is the beginning of the curve of joy.”
― Djuna Barnes, Nightwood

“The truth is life is full of joy and full of great sorrow, but you can't have one without the other.”
― Andre Dubus III, House of Sand and Fog

“Maybe there is a beast… maybe it's only us.”
― William Golding, Lord of the Flies

“Only a psychopath would ever think of doing these things, only a psychopath would dream of abusing other people in such a way, only a psychopath would treat people as less than human just for money. The shocking truth is, even though they now have most if not all of the money, they want still more, they want all of the money that you have left in your pockets, they want it all because they have no empathy with other people, with other creatures, they have no feeling for the world which they exploit, they have no love or sense of being or belonging for their souls are dead, dead to all things but greed and a desire to rule over others.”
― Arun D. Ellis, Corpalism

“Don't wait for a light to appear at the end of the tunnel, stride down there and light the bloody thing yourself.”
― Sara Henderson

“Censorship is to art as lynching is to justice.”
― Henry Louis Gates Jr

“Every generation imagines itself to be more intelligent than the one that went before it, and wiser than the one that comes after it.”
― George Orwell

“She believed, of course ... because without something to believe in, life would be intolerable.”
― Rosamunde Pilcher, The Shell Seekers

“Who holds Wayfinder finds good roads,
Its master's step is brisk;
The Sword of Wisdom lightens loads
But adds unto their risk.”
― Fred Saberhagen, The Complete Book of Swords

“The vision of Van Helsing as a vampire is one before which my imagination balks; this is doubtless only a shortcoming on my part; he may have been well fitted for the role, since as we have seen he had already the power, by means of speech, to cast his victims into a stupor.”
― Fred Saberhagen, The Dracula Tape

“Farslayer howls across the world
For thy heart! For thy heart! who hast wronged me,
Vengeance is his who casts the Blade,
Yet he will, in the end, no triumph see.”
― Fred Saberhagen

“When patterns are broken, new worlds emerge.”
― Tuli Kupferberg

“There is an odd synchronicity in the way parallel lives veer to touch one another, change direction, and then come close again and again until they connect and hold for whatever it was that fate intended to happen.”
― Ann Rule

“Any fool can be happy. It takes a man with real heart to make beauty out of the stuff that makes us weep.”
― Clive Barker, Abarat: Days of Magic, Nights of War

“Reading brings us unknown friends”
― Honore de Balzac

“There is no real ending. It’s just the place where you stop the story.”
― Frank Herbert

“Whisper in the yard and turn the trees all into toys
Lay there on the ground, and turn the dirt into your joy
From what I see and what I know, it's all been boring lately
So I suggest we trade a question mark in for a maybe
Time your riddles right, and make a point that has no sense
Make sure that you're smiling, and the money's been well spent
Innocence and ignorance, it all goes hand in hand
I'm not sure that I'm right, but I hope you'll understand
I hope that you're still searching for the start that has no end
And all the plastic people have now become your friends
Before you start to drift and your soul begins to scream
I just wanted to tell you that you're listening to a dream”
― Shinedown

“An adult life...is a slowly emerging design, with shifting components, occasional dramatic disruptions, and fresh creative arrangements.”
― Jill Ker Conway

“Let's think the unthinkable, let's do the undoable. Let us prepare to grapple with the ineffable itself, and see if we may not eff it after all.”
― Douglas Adams, Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency